the tunnel

[misterx]

This makes me think of the entrance to Moria.


This is a detail of the right-hand wall in the photo above. Cool eh?


This is the other end of the tunnel. Oddly, walking through from one side seemed shorter than walking through from the other. And when I look at the photo below, it LOOKS shorter too. Go figure.

Comments

[dasenergi.livejournal.com]

I love the first, B&W one. Can I see it in color too?

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

Nifty. Like something out of a horror movie.

[cuntishness.livejournal.com]

that detail... holy cow.

[exandthecity.livejournal.com]

these are really extraordinary!

I hope you don't mind me popping in. I am Gabrielle a friend of Shadows and she told me about your photography.

I love the tones and details on these.
The light is flawless. It has a sort of suggestive quality I love.

- G

[misterx.livejournal.com]

Don't mind at all. I've enjoyed looking at your work as well.

Have fun in NY. I'm jealous. :)

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

Reminds me of the tunnel in "Spirited Away." Eerie and beautiful.

[summerwind783.livejournal.com]

That is what I thought too!!

[natf.livejournal.com]

I like the second, third and fourth more than the first, personally, but they are all awesome!

[natf.livejournal.com]

By the way - I keep meaning to ask you what your workflow is to make a digital photo -> B&W? Desaturate or convert to grayscale? Other? I have never had much luck with either - they end up flat and dull... ;-p

[misterx.livejournal.com]

Heh... I just learned something new week. For the shots of the people at the club, I set my camera to monochrome mode (b/w) and messed about with the params until I was happy, then kept shooting.

When I got home and downloaded, they appeared b/w in the previews, but when I went to edit, they turned back to color! I was pretty confused for a bit. Then I realized that since I shoot in RAW mode, b/w is just an interpretation of the sensor data, and the b/w setting wasn't translating when i went to edit mode.

Anyway, the workflow is I always shoot in RAW. Once I download, I make the choice whether it is b/w or color in Lightroom. I usually intend it one way or the other when I shoot anyway, but it's nice to have the flexibility.

I don't desaturate, that does tend to make flat looking pics. I do a lot of tweaking of light/dark levels, contrast, black level, etc.

When I really want to tweak something, I set individual grey level conversions for specific color channels. For example, if I have a medium red over grass, a straight desaturate would make them equally gray, and my photo looks flat. But if I tell the red channel to convert lighter, and the green darker, I can enhance the contrast between the two in the b/w version.

The equivalent in Photoshop is to use the Channel Mixer to do your b/w conversion. Not quite as much control but basically the same thing. Check "monochrome" in the lower left corner of the box, and then adjust the R B G levels to get the look you want. Paint Shop Pro has a channel mixer too.

Here's an example I made:


I'll warn you though, watch out darkening the blue channel too much. No faster way to make the sky turn to oatmeal. Blue gets noisy quick.

[natf.livejournal.com]

Ah hah! Thank you for this.

My D100 did not have a B&W mode but I think that the new D40x does so I will try all of this!

[natf.livejournal.com]

Also, I use PS CS (not 2 or 3) and it cannot read the raw files from the d40x so I use jpeg fine. There is an additional app that I can run to convert the d40x raw (nef) files into a generic raw file that PS can read but that is yet *another* step in the workflow...

I don't have the readies/cash to buy lightroom or PS CS2/3 and do not take photos often enough to make it cost effective. Maybe if/when I get around to start making money out of my images (any more ideas?) then it will be worth it.

[misterx.livejournal.com]

If I knew how to make money with my images, I'd be a happy man. As it is, I make few sales.

[natf.livejournal.com]

Ah. *hugs*

[busychild424.livejournal.com]

OMG the first one FTW

and thanks for this quick tutorial - I didn't even know there were other ways to make grayscale happen.

[misterx.livejournal.com]

More than one way to make it happen, but this is the best way to make it HAPPENIN'!

ok, that was lame. lolz

[busychild424.livejournal.com]

you're a dork hahaha

[misterx.livejournal.com]

I think the second is probably my fav.

[natf.livejournal.com]

Yeah - that is the composition that I would have liked to sketch if I had been there...